Our site here was beautiful. There are a couple of site right along the lake, and there's nothing…read morebetter than being able to jump in the lake right from your temporary home. (Tip: 129,130,131 and there are few on the other side)
Sites however, are pretty close together, and some in the oddest of places which remained empty all weekend. Between sites, are barely a few trees, if you're lucky enough, so if you're looking for something more private, I would avoid this park. I saw some sites where you're dining with your neighbour the entire time. I think there must be more trees in my neighbourhood at back in the city.
I was also shocked and annoyed by the freight train that rumbles and honks its horn very loudly. Friday night, it was happening almost every hour until past 12am, less on the weekend, but unavoidable. Everytime it happened, it reminded me that I'm not secluded in the woods and that I will have to back to the city. It was great when it was quiet.
They also had some weird rule about having only 1 car parked at your site, even though in most cases, there clearly was enough space. I don't know if this was just a cash grab of $12 a night, but highly inconvenient.
This was the first place I've seen with non-outhouse toilets scattered about. They were even cleaner than the comfort stations (area with showers). That was nice for someone like me.
There's not much to do here really, and it is perfect for those who want to just relax and not do much. Swim in the lake and enjoy being outdoors. For hiking, you'll have to drive 30mins to Seguin park as there are no trails here. They have canoe rentals (with ridiculous policies, more on that later), but really can go just around the lake and not much to see. There's a beach, but it's not big, and the sand was damp with tire marks. It seemed like the type of place you would stay, but during the day venture out to do other things. There was even movie times posted in the office for Parry Sound, and wondering if that is an activity people do here.
Do not trust the signage in the office. For some reason they are wrong and are not updated. The girls in there, would give conflicting information and was extremely confused the more questions we asked. It was frustrating.
Our canoe rental experience here has prompted us to go and purchase our own, as this was probably most convoluted process I've experienced. They state in the newspaper and signs that a full day rental $42, 4 hours $25. Apparently a full day means 8am-4pm, and not overnight. The canoe has to be returned at 3pm or 3:30pm (depends who you ask) as the office closes at 4pm.
We had assumed that full day meant an overnight rental (we also called to confirm) so Saturday morning we weren't in a rush to go get the canoe or use it. most other parks have this policy.
When we got to the office around 1pm, we were told we had to return the canoe at 4pm or be charged a penalty of $42. We only had the option of renting it at $25. Now if they just had stated an overnight rental would be $67....
After checking if there was other places to rent a canoe, we decided on the now 3 hours of canoe. But then filling out the paper work (she was so slow!) and then going out to check the scratches on the canoe so thoroughly like rental car ate into our paid canoeing time at least 30mins. And we were the only ones renting, so what was the fuss. There was also a $500 deposit. Upon returning the canoe she almost forgot that we rented 2 canoes, and therefore should be owed $1000 back.
I wasn't impressed by the whole thing more infuriated by the consistent information given to us by the office.
The area is great, but probably would only come back to this park wiser, with our own canoe, and stay longer (so that going out to excursions wouldn't seem like it was so wasteful) just to have access to the beautiful lake.
